Charging apparatus.



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UNTED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

THOMAS FRANCIS WITHERBEE AND JOHN GLMAN vVITHERBEE, OF PORT HENRY, NEW'YORK.

CHARGENG APPARATUS.

Patented Aug. 14, 1906.

Appication lcd August 15, E04. Serial No. 2213.795.

To all wkont .it may con/cern:

Be it known that We, Tiroiaas Financie WITHERBEE and JOHN GILMANWITHERBEE, citizens of the United States, and residents of Port Henry inthe county of Essex and State oi New York, have invented a new andlmproved Charging Apparatus, of which theiolowing is a foil, ciear, andexact descrl tion.

Our invention relates to a charging evice l an annuler bell in the formof an inverted VV combined with a small bell carried by the annular belland with an inner hopper rising from the a ex of the annular bell, asshown by Patent o. 518,769, issued to T. F. Witherbee on April 24, 1894.Such apparatus is not adapted to mechanical iilling, and se fails tomoet one of the conditions new desired to suit the presentblast-furnaces.

Reference is to be had to the accompanying drawings, forming a part ofthis speciiica tion, in which similar characters of reference indicatecorresponding parts in both the figures.

Figure 1 is a vertical sectional view of the upper part of ablast-furnace, showing in section a preferred form of our invention; and2 1s a bottom View of the bell shown in he furnace is provided with theusual hopper a and lip-ring t. A bell c is employed to close the lowerportion ci' the lipring. A conical ring d is also provided below thebeli, but having a surface mounted above the lower edge thereof, so thatthe bell will support the conical ring in an obvious manner. To preventthe upper edge of the ring d from catching on the lip-ring l), guides alare provided upon the latter.

An inverted conical ring e is placed belowT the ring d and may be formedintegral with said ring or may be secured to it in any deairedl orconvenient manner. The ring e is' provided with a skeieton frameconsisting of arms f, and with a hub g, preferably integrally connectedwith the arms, and is supported by a rod' k, secured to the hub andpassing throughs, hollow sleeve t', which slpperts the beil c. The rin sd and e are signed as Vdistrirniters or the material charged into thehopper. It Will be obvious that the lowering ing the ring d wlll permitthe material to be char ed throu h the bottom of the lip-ring andistribute in thc center oi the furnace, the ring e acting to revent itsdistribution near the Walls and to eep the material in the center. Thisoperation is indicated in dotted lines in Fig. 1. It will also beobvious that by lowering both the bell c and ring d the twojvillconstitute a single bell to o crate in the same manner as the sin le bels now employed and that the materia will then be distributed over theouter portion of the furnace near its Walls. For the purpose ofacconipiishing these operations cyiinders j` and le are. provided,having piston-rods l and m, res Yectivel Y. These rods are connected bylin s ZY an m with levers n and o, which are pivoted to a stationarypart p ci the furnace and are connected with the sieeve i and rod fr.,respectively. Ccunteriveights g and r may also be provided to keep thebel and ring in their highest position and prevent the discharge ofmaterials from the, hopper at undesired times.

It will be understood that the char e passing through the space left bythe be i c virili freely drop through the skeleton framef.' It will alsobe understood that the angle oi the ring e to the vertical may be chaned to suit the conditions revailing in the urnace or the particular kindof material employed and that, if desired, it may be vertical, as Wellas inclined. Y

As the central and circumferential charging are done by separateoperations, by varying the kind or quantity o the materials reviouslydeposited in the hopper beneficia results may be obtained. For instance,should the furnace be too open or free in the center, more finematerials may be deposited in that locality sini ly by loading thehopper e with that class o material and lowerin the bell c. A similaroperation ma be pe ormed for causing the outside of t e charge to beless ee. f

it will be understood that the particular of the bell c Without lower-YIOO form of the device which we have illustrated and described merelyrepresents one embodiment of our invention and that the latter is notlimited thereto.

Many modications may obviously be made and other forms of operatingdevices may be substituted for those shown without departing from thespirit of the invention.

Having thus described our invention, we claim as new and desire tosecure by Letters Patent- In a charging device the combination of afeed-hopper providedwitll a lip-ring having an open bottom, a conicalring havin an open top movable downwardly from the ottom of saidlip-ring and adapted to be seated against the lower edge of thelip-ring, the ol'pening in the top of said ring being of s ightly lessdiameter than the opening in the bottom of the lip-ring, said conlcalring also having an inverted conical distributerextending downwardlytherefrom near the outer ed e of the conical ring, a spider connectedwlth the lower ed e of said distributer, a rod connected with t e sliderfor raising and lowering the conical bell; means for raising andlowering the rod, a main bell located within the conical ring and of adiameter greater than the diameter of the opening therein, whereby thebell is adapted to close the opening in the conical ring, and the ringand bell together close the opening in the lipring, and means for movingthe main bell downwardly from the ol enin'g in the `conical ringindependently of tllie motion of the latter.

In testimony whereof we have signed our names to this specification inthe presence of two subscribing witnesses.

THOMAS FRANCIS WITHERBTEE. JOHN GILMAN WITHERBEE. Witnesses:

WM. VIGGERs, E. L. GHATHAM.

